NCIS Exclusive: Sopranos Alum Eyed as Ziva's Successor, Debut Set For November

TVLine has learned exclusively that Sopranos gradEmily Wickersham — she played A.J.’s girlfriend Rhiannon during the HBO drama’s sixth and final season — is joining the CBS smash as a potential successor to Cote de Pablo’s Ziva.

Wickersham, whose three-episode deal with the show contains a series regular option, will play Bishop, a bright, educated, athletic, attractive, fresh-faced, focused and somewhat socially awkward new agent. She has a mysterious mixture of analytic brilliance, fierce determination and idealism. She’s traveled extensively, but only feels comfortable at home.” (CBS tends to do these trial runs to ensure the actor/actress in question is a good fit. See also: The Mentalist.)

Currently recurring on FX’s The Bridge as the stepdaughter of Annabeth Gish’s character, Wickersham will make her NCIS debut during November sweeps.

Prior to that, the show will “rotate some fun people” through the agency’s doors. “The first two episodes are all about Ziva’s departure,” EP Gary Glasberg recently told TVLine. “And then in the third episode we [begin to] introduce some different characters. And then, hopefully, when people are comfortable enough, one will walk in and be The One.”